OrienTel Tunisia MCA (Modern Colloquial Arabic) database

The OrienTel Tunisia MCA (Modern Colloquial Arabic) database comprises 792 Tunisian speakers (426 males, 366 females) recorded over the Tunisian fixed and mobile telephone network. This database is partitioned into 1 CD and 1 DVD. The speech databases made within the OrienTel project were validated by SPEX, the Netherlands, to assess their compliance with the OrienTel format and content specifications.Speech samples are stored as sequences of 8-bit 8 kHz A-law. Each prompted utterance is stored in a separate file. Each signal file is accompanied by an ASCII SAM label file which contains the relevant descriptive information.Each speaker uttered the following items:•1 isolated single digit•1 sequence of 10 isolated digits•5 connected digits : 1 prompt sheet number (6 digits), 1 telephone number (6-15 digits), 1 credit card number (14-16 digits), 1 PIN code (6 digits), 1 spontaneous phone number•2 currency money amounts•1 natural number•4 dates : 1 spontaneous (date or year of birth), 1 prompted date, 1 relative or general date expression, 1 prompted date phrase (Islamic calendar)•2 time phrases : 1 time of day (spontaneous), 1 time phrase (word style)•3 spelled words : 1 spontaneous (own forename), 1 city name, 1 real word for coverage•5 directory assistance utterances : 1 spontaneous, own forename, 1 city of childhood (spontaneous), 1 frequent city name, 1 frequent company name, 1 common forename and surname•2 yes/no questions : 1 predominantly ”yes” question, 1 predominantly ”no” question•6 application keywords/keyphrases•1 word spotting phrase using embedded application words•4 phonetically rich words•9 phonetically rich sentences•2+3 spontaneous items (for control)•1 free spontaneous speechThe following age distribution has been obtained: 516 speakers are between 16 and 30, 193 speakers are between 31 and 45, 82 speakers are between 46 and 60, 1 speaker over 60.A pronunciation lexicon with a phonemic transcription in SAMPA is also included.